Good morning my fellow writers, game designers, and readers! I’m back from a wonderful writer’s retreat and am deep in the trenches. I’ve got a few announcements to make, so bear with me today.

Firefly RPG Wins 2nd Runner Up: In the Golden Geek Awards, the Firefly RPG won 2nd Runner Up behind Dungeons and Dragons 5th Edition and Call of Cthulhu 7th Edition. Congrats to everyone who worked on this game, both past and present, and to the fans for voting! If you’re interested in trying out the RPG, the corebook is available in digital through DriveThruRPG.com and in print through www.margaretweis.com and wherever games are sold.

Reddit AMA in /r/Fantasy: Thanks to the support and prompting by Steve Drew, I’ll be on Reddit doing an AMA on Monday, March 2nd. Celebrating my 10th year in the gaming industry, so drop by and ask questions about the Firefly RPG or my earlier work. I’m keen on answering questions about the shiny new Smuggler’s Guide to the Rim.

Watch for me at GTS: I will be attending the Gama Trade Show in Las Vegas and will be presenting as a game designer/developer. Very excited about this! It’ll give me a chance to connect with other industry folks and retailers, and talk about some of my experiences that I’ve had over the past decade.

New Reward Tiers on the Dark Eras Kickstarter: A lot of fans are really interested in expanding the existing chapters in the Dark Eras supplement, and there’ll be new reward tiers announced later today. Drop by later and check ’em out! We’re in the final throes of this wild ride!

Build-a-World at Mo*Con: I’m happy to announce that I’ve confirmed I’ll be running my Build-a-World Game Show at Mo*Con X! Yay! There will be shenanigans! I am hoping to find a sponsor to pick up the tab for the charity donation. Last year, Steven Saus donated $50 on behalf of his publishing company at ConText, and the winning team got to choose which charity to put that money towards.

Almost 1,500 backers. Over $90,000. And FOUR DAYS left!!! Wanted to give you an update that new reward tiers and polls will be launched as we ramp up to the end.

Thanks to all of you who backed the Dark Eras Kickstarter, shared your thoughts, and voted for this uniquely-developed book to add new Eras!

And thanks to those of you who’ve been reading along. The fact that I’m part of a Kickstarter isn’t easy on your end, simply because of the frequent updates you’re often subjected to. I do realize that and try to opt for the middle ground. I appreciate your support for my work either way. You rock!

I am pleased to announce a brand new release for the Firefly RPG. The Smuggler’s Guide to the Rim is a supplement designed for both players and GMs. It introduces Reputation rules for Crewmembers, 12 new archetypes, the Good Shepherd’s Run, more Chinese translations, more rules, new in game aids, a pair of Episodes, and more!

I am pleased to announce that Doubting Souls, our Hunter: the Vigil chapter covering 1690 to 1695 in Salem Town, Salem Village, and Boston is part of the next stretch goal for the Dark Eras Kickstarter.

There’s been quite a few questions about how we might expand that text, and we’re mulling over different options that are related to this Era and its overall plot should we win the vote. We did present some Native American material in the existing chapter that puts this Era in historical context, and you can read the entire chapter through the Kickstarter page.

Should you vote for Hunter, we will take the same, special care we did with the rest of the material to present new material for Native American tribes in context for this chapter. While this is alternate history, specifically designed for the World of Darkness, this topic in particular means a lot to both my developer and myself. We take it very seriously, and we feel it’s our duty to do the best job we possibly can for you, the fans, but also because we feel it’s our responsibility as writers, too.

Good luck to our fellow writers and developers on this neat stretch goal!

Apex Publications is pleased to announce the addition of a new anthology to its 2015 release schedule. Upside Down: Inverted Tropes in Storytelling is an anthology of short stories and poems that will highlight the long-standing tradition of writers who identify tropes in science fiction, fantasy, and horror and twist them into something new and interesting.

“I am excited to be working with two fantastic, smart, and gifted editors like Jaym Gates and Monica Valentinelli,” says Jason Sizemore, the publisher of Apex Book Company. “They should only enhance the Apex reputation as one of the genre’s leading anthology publishers with the release of Upside Down.”

Edited by Jaym Gates (War Stories) and Monica Valentinelli (Haunted: 11 Tales of Ghostly Horrors), the anthology will debut in Fall/Winter 2015 in both digital and print. The anthology will be Gates’s second collection with Apex Book Company and Valentinelli’s first. A Kickstarter and open submissions period are also planned for this fall.

To find out more about Upside Down: Inverted Tropes in Storytelling, be sure to watch for milestone-related updates from the editors posted on the Apex Book Company website.